


A Warden Doesn't Submit

by Toshi_Nama



Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-16
Updated: 2018-03-16
Packaged: 2019-04-01 03:16:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13989321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Toshi_Nama/pseuds/Toshi_Nama





	A Warden Doesn't Submit

                Weisshaupt.  Somewhere she’d avoided – and the center of the Order she was still bound to by Vows and the corruption in her blood, at least for the moment.

                “We shouldn’t be here, Alissa.”

                Nathaniel was right – but she had no choice.  She’d never had many choices: not within the constraints of the Templars at the Circle, not once Duncan conscripted her to save her from the Knight-Commander angry she’d shown non-mages could corrupt…as her mentor had asked, knowing she would pay any price, damn him.  And ever since, the creeping corruption in her blood, the whispers, the nightmares that had at least gotten fewer since she and Alistair had defied all odds and ended the Fifth Blight.  Even since, she was Warden-Commander, with those obligations…and as bound by Queen Anora’s paranoia and hatred for the Wardens who’d showed her father’s true colors at the Landsmeet, who’d executed him…and who she owed the throne, for one of them had the better claim.  The one who’d gone to Weisshaupt to try warn them about a risen Magister, one of the Seven who brought the Taint to the world.  The one who, in two and a half years, hadn’t returned.

                She sighed.  “I had to leave to the West, following Morrigan’s lead.  I abandoned him.”  In a lower voice, “I knew what Weisshaupt wanted, and tried to protect him from that.  And this is what that led to – he had no idea how desperately they wanted knowledge, knowledge he doesn’t have.”  Knowledge she’d foolishly tried to protect him from.  No more, not after this.  He’d done it for the Inquisitor…but mostly had done it for her.  Nathaniel told her what he’d done: when Vigil’s Keep started feeling the Calling, he’d sent almost all the senior Wardens out into the Free Marches, hoping it was far enough away.  Sigrun, Nathaniel, Hans, Maxine, a dozen more.  Whoever he knew she’d valued, as many as he could justify to the Queen and, if asked, the Order.  Recruiting, exploring near that old Thaig in the Deep Roads with the Architect’s assistance (though that was never admitted), negotiating for supplies to finish the new library at the Keep, the training academy she’d had the Wardens sponsor in Amaranthine.

                “Alissa.”

                “Nathaniel, you can’t talk me out of this.  You should know that by now.”  He smiled slightly at that one, a smile that vanished as she continued.  “You know almost everything I do, but I need to tell you the rest.  I left the notes in Val Royeaux, in a pile with my kinswoman’s things.  No one will go through it for some time.”  Her mouth tightened.  “Even the Order would hesitate to go after the Inquisitor, even if it occurred to them to look for the papers.  My usual cipher.”

                “What are you doing?”

                “I can’t take you with me.  We three are the only ones outside Morrigan who could put together the pieces, and I haven’t heard from her since I’ve been back.  You have to stay free, have to be ready to command Vigil’s Keep, keep it from the Order if you must.  The short: there is a cure for the Calling.”  She heard his sharp intake of breath, but the words kept tripping out.  “It’s more dangerous for non-mages, more dangerous the longer you’ve been Tainted.  We may be able to work with the Architect to learn more…I don’t know if we can use it on his Darkspawn, to free them from the Taint as well.  They were born that way, it’s likely to kill them.”  She thought.  “You already know about Corypheus, and the demon who’s grown  fat on the fears of the Blight.  One last thing: Morrigan knows a way to end a Blight, to take down an Archdemon, without needing a Warden’s sacrifice.”  Even know, she couldn’t say more – especially now, now that she’d seen the letter from Alistair, heard how he’d met his son, how Morrigan had softened and raised him in love and with only good words, if few, of who his father had been.”

                “You mean – the Archdemon Urthemial, that’s how you survived?  This mage gave you a way that didn’t sacrifice a Warden’s soul with the Old God’s?”

                “Yes.  But none of that matters right now.  All that matters is keeping the knowledge, studying it, and making sure it isn’t swallowed by an Order that is willing to use any means to force another Warden to talk.  The Order has gone too far.  Call on the awakened Darkspawn, I’ve felt them following me since I’ve been back.  They’ll help you.”  She looked up at the hazy sunrise, tears filling her eyes, as she repeated the words from Alistair’s last letter.  “I can fix this, I swear.  Nathaniel, I have to.  It’s Alistair.”

                The tall, dark Warden pulled her into a rough hug, and she wiped her face on his shirt.  “Then you will, Warden-Commander.  And if even an Archdemon can’t stand up to you two, the Order won’t either.  Just…be careful how much you share.  The Order will protect itself.”

                She sniffled once, then put her fear, her hope, her love in a tiny locked corner of her heart.  There wasn’t time for it any longer.  “You’re right, Nathaniel.  But they _will_ give me back my husband.  Or I will tear Weisshaupt down around us all.”  At this point, with what Avernus had taught her and what she’d learned…especially with Alistair and the Calanhad bloodline close enough to call on, she probably could.

**

                “Warden-Commander Alissa of Fereldan, here to see the Council.”  The only words she’d spoken to a stream of steadily more senior Wardens.  She had no pack, kept her cloak over her armor, her staff comfortably, loosely in her hand, it towering over her like the warriors around her.  But she’d done what they hadn’t: she’d faced down an Archdemon itself, faced down a Queen in full rage, faced down…she wouldn’t think of her odd ally, not here.

                Finally, the Council.  The questions, shouted at her.  She stood in an empty circle, their chairs…thrones…towering over her.  _Fools. All that height means is it’s easier to knock you down.  I’ve been towered over my entire life – do you think I care anymore?_

                “Wardens.  Seniors of the Order.  I’ve come to collect one of my own.  He brought a message to you.  I’m assuming in the last two and a half years, even Alistair’s figured out how to string the correct words together well enough for you to understand it.  I managed in just a week, but I have more experience with him.”  Her voice bit, and she watched a handful pale in rage.  Worse, in their minds…a quiet rustle of chuckles from the other Wardens gathered.

                Weisshaupt’s Warden-Commander spoke, his voice deep and cold, but he’d never been in the Wilds, marched through the frozen muck.  “There are other things we need from you.  How the Archdemon fell, what happened in Amaranthine.”

                “I’ve already told you both.  The Archdemon died when I stuck it with a sword.”  She shrugged.  “I’d guessed Warden Riordan had somehow survived the fall just enough to take it with him – we burned his body in ceremony.  I don’t know why the soul would have travelled so far, but Riordan had little time to pass on the Order’s knowledge before the battle.  I assume something about how he had forced it to ground?”  She was too old to play the naif, but stuck to that.  She was a Warden less than a year then, knew nothing of the secrets, and therefore couldn’t answer their questions.

                _“Lies!”_ The shout came from another of the Council, and her eyes narrowed as she saw the faint sword still etched in his armor.  This one had been a Templar, in his previous life – and she saw the old distrust of magic in his eyes.  She discounted the fact she actually was lying this time.

                “You say that, but you weren’t there.  What use are lies?  The Archdemon is a decade dead: if Urthemial hadn’t been stopped by a Grey Warden, he would have re-emerged years ago.  We all would have heard his song in our dreams.”  She turned back to her fellow Commander.  “And in Amaranthine, we must have had a chunk of the Horde tunnel back to the surface somehow.  They do that, you know.  They were led by an Emmisary, perhaps that’s why they stayed together.  But why they went there – are Darkspawn still attracted to Wardens, still recognize us, outside a Blight?  I’ve never gotten an answer to that.”

                “Immaterial.  What they did shouldn’t have happened.”

                “And neither should keeping a fellow Warden.  Bring him here.  Now.”

                A silky smile from the Templar.  “He is being questioned, since you wouldn’t answer.  He will.  So will you, if the right…pressure…is applied.”

                “I have answered.”  She ignored the chill at his other words, what had been done to her love.

                “Tranquil don’t lie, little mage.”

                “So this is what the Order comes to?”  She spoke toward the Commander, but to the massed Wardens.  “Threatening to strip the mind of a fellow Warden Commander, torture of a senior Warden, and for what?  Because a paranoid man soon to face his Calling thinks they should know more?”  Her voice was cold, and got softer – she saw Wardens lean forward from the corner of her eye, as she slipped deeper into the Taint in her blood, the twisted song that connected them all.  This must have been how Corypheus got to them.  “One of the Seven was loose and awake, because the Order failed.  He almost destroyed the world, and used the Order to do it.  What makes you think the other six aren’t still out there?  You know I have allies: the mad Queen would have exiled the Order again otherwise. _Don’t threaten me when you don’t know what I can do.”_ The last was in a carrying whisper, and she saw their eyes change.

                The Templar attempted to nullify her magic: she shot him back into his seat with a gesture and the pulse of taint in her blood, her staff staying planted at her side.  His head hit the back of the chair with a satisfying crunch, and he slumped.

                “Look at what you’ve become.”  Her voice was vicious now, insulting.  “From saviors of Thedas to old men afraid of their shadows, afraid to speak truth even to their brothers in Taint and death.  In Peace, Vigilance.  In War, Victory.  In Death, Sacrifice.  Join us, brothers and sisters…is this all those words mean to you?” She was so close to turning the listening Wardens, and the Commander saw it.

                “Bring the Warden Alistair.  Give him to this woman.  There are no longer Wardens in Orlais and Ferelden.  If they wish to risk everything, they can take it.  They were corrupted by Corypheus, and have sold themselves to the Inquisition.  They are Wardens no more.”

                _I can fix this. I can use this._ She waited as they brought out a shambling, bloody figure, dressed in cheap clothes.  She didn’t reach out, couldn’t comfort him, not here.  She focused again, through the Taint they didn’t know how to use, and saw him steady on his feet.  “As you will.  Ferelden and Orlais are independent of the Order.  Alistair, with me.”  She turned and walked out the long hallway with a steady pace, slow enough for him to hold.  Her hand trembled with the need to support him, who’d kept their secrets and paid a terrible price – but she had to save them first.

                Past the line of trees, Nathaniel’s faint whispering call, the sense of taint as their dark allies circled in the shadows.  She reached for him as he collapsed.  “I’m here, love.  You’ll be ok.”  She poured mana into the spirits recklessly, begging them to heal him.  The wounds closed, his eyes brightened…but nothing she knew could restore his ear, could wipe away the scars and burns she saw through the torn cloth.

                “The Order abandoned the South?  Did I hear Mr. Important correctly?”

                Her lips twitched at his so-familiar tone, whispered though it was.  “Clean water, please.”  An acknowledgement from one of the Darkspawn, and a rough container was brought to her.  She tore his sleeve, used it to wipe his face until he took it from her.  “Yes, you did.  I’ll fix this, I swear.”

“That sounds like my line, Liss.” He pulled her close, kissed her gently. She saw his eyes, and realized how much he’d changed. “Send to Morrigan, she promised she’d answer. The Inquisitor will support us, already is in Orlais.” Tears spilled down her eyes as he continued. “Oh, no, please don’t cry!” His voice got a touch of panic. “Not my Rose, not the woman who eats Genlocks for breakfast!”

A throat cleared from the shadows of the firs.

“I mean, Unawakened Genlocks, of course.” Alistair’s hurried correction made Alissa giggle faintly as the silence settled again. “We can fix this, Liss. I swear.”

                “We can fix this.”  Her heart sang at those words, the burdens suddenly lighter as she curled up in his arms.  “All of you, please go somewhere else.  And look the other way for an hour or two.”  A chuckle from the one human, a dropped pack for ‘later,’ and the flickers of taint moved further in the forest.  “Now, let’s get you out of those ratty things.”


End file.
